Steve Coppin

I was always drawing in my youth and had considered a career in engineering but art classes in school were always so much more satisfying. I graduated in 1973 from Humboldt State University with a degree in Art, where in addition to drawing, much of my energy was spent in the print lab, doing silkscreen and intaglio printmaking. In the mid seventies, I worked at the Humboldt Cultural Center on 1st Street in Eureka, followed by four years as a letterpress printer in Crescent City. I moved to Seattle in 1981, and for the next twenty five years, worked as a freelance illustrator doing work for advertising agencies and design studios. I returned to Eureka in 2005 and then relocated once again to Crescent City in 2013 where I am now concentrating on my own imagery and creating my fine art prints.

I began seeing computers in the offices of art directors in the mid-eighties. A dozen years later in 1997 and after observing the new digital work that artists were creating, I bought my first Macintosh and have never looked back. I am self-taught and don't consider myself an expert but I have learned how to create the look I want. I try to avoid special filters and other canned effects and rely heavily on the traditional design elements that I learned in school. Some people disagree, but I believe using computers and digital printers to produce limited edition art prints is a natural progression in fine art printmaking. My images are created on a computer and do not physically exist until they are printed on paper. I do my own printing in-studio with an eight color inkjet printer using archival pigment inks on cotton rag paper. My editions are limited to no more than ten signed and numbered prints of any one image.

My favorite artists are those who do the human form well and my current work is mostly figurative, working from photo reference. My images are of people in everyday situations that we all observe in life. My use of line as a frequent design element is influenced by my own drawing experience and by my appreciation of the line drawings of both traditional and contemporary artists. I like to create interest with composition and color to make strong graphic images that suggest a mood of quiet contemplation in a clean, minimalist way.